


Make People; Influence friends

by thought



Category: Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-22
Updated: 2017-07-22
Packaged: 2018-12-05 09:17:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,632
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11575065
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thought/pseuds/thought
Summary: Scenes from a partyOrAhsoka is having a crisis of faith, Anakin is just a crisis, Rex does not get paid enough for this (or at all, ever), and Cody and Obi-Wan are both absolutely 100 percent fine.





	Make People; Influence friends

**Author's Note:**

> I have a not-insignificant number of feelings about Obi-Wan and Cody's relationship from their military responsibilities all the way to how they'd do kink, please help I never asked for this. Anyway have some fic I wrote because work has been boring as fuck.  
> I have started yelling very quietly about Star Wars on my [tumblr](http://thought-.tumblr.com), come enable me.

"This feels inappropriate," Ahsoka says, trying to be subtle about dropping the vegetables she's picked off her triangle sandwich into a potted cactus. "Does this feel inappropriate to you?"

"Not as inappropriate as our General is being with Senator Amidala," Rex says, cheerfully.

"Yeah, but that's like, baseline inappropriate. Everybody's used to it-- oh wow, is his hand actually--"

"No," says Rex. "Please don't acknowledge that that's happening, Commander."

"Why do you think this is inappropriate?" Cody asks, trying to refocus them away from Skywalker. Plausible deniability is sometimes the only safe path.

"Well," Ahsoka frowns. "Jedi aren't supposed to accept gifts or rewards. We're supposed to be doing good for the galaxy for the sake of doing good. A whole celebration to honour us just feels... wrong."

"There is nothing good about what we're doing," Obi-Wan says, appearing out of a flock of CEOs and almost falling against Cody's side before he rights himself. He looks windswept, which is concerning given the fact that they're indoors. "But you needn't worry about compromising your values. This celebration is for the Jedi in name only."

"And for us not even that," Rex says, quietly enough that Cody doesn't think anyone else heard him. He sends him a warning glance nonetheless.

Obi-Wan folds his hands into the sleeves of his formal robes; and Cody's surprised he's not holding a drink until he gets a look at his slightly dilated pupils and if his stupid Jedi is using stims to get through a fucking civilian party he is going to tie him to a bed in Medical himself.

"Think of this like you would a mission where you accept tokens of gratitude in order not to upset cultural tradition. The Senate can't maintain public sympathies toward the war without making a show of how much they value their soldiers."

"Your tax dollars at work," Ahsoka says, with the deliberate flippancy of someone who has just learned the phrase. Cody respects the hell out of her but she's still so damn young it makes his teeth ache with words he can't say.

"Well, someone's at least," Obi-Wan says. "It isn't as if any of us pay taxes."

"I think that makes it worse," Ahsoka says.

"I think we're paying in sentient life," Obi-Wan says, a little sharply, and then "Oh, good, Anakin decided to grace us with his presence after all."

Rex opens his mouth. "Do not," Cody says.

"I probably ought to go deal with... that," Obi-Wan says, resignedly.

"I think the Chancellor's got it," Ahsoka says, rising up on her toes to see over the crowd.

"Gods, you don't think the Chancellor knows," Obi-Wan says, blinking at Ahsoka.

Ahsoka winces. "Well, I mean, if my master was going to tell anybody--"

"Yes, yes, you make a valid point," Obi-Wan cuts her off. Rex and Ahsoka exchange a look that Cody can't interpret. Obi-Wan brushes his hair out of his eyes with a hand that trembles so slightly most people would never be able to tell. Cody's starting to realistically consider the logistics of forcing the man to Medical after the celebration.

A pair of senators descend on them before they can go another round of 'Anakin Skywalker is bad and Obi-Wan should feel bad'. Cody doesn't recognize them --they'd received the briefing about the celebration about an hour before it began-- but Obi-Wan smiles his Negotiator smile and greets them both by name, clasping their hands like he's been waiting all evening for a chance to speak to these specific people.

The first fifty times Cody watched him do this sort of thing he'd been impressed. Embarrassingly so, if he's being honest. He knows he's not always great at complicated social navigation. Now watching Obi-Wan's stance and tone and expressions all shift seamlessly into what will get him the results he wants just makes Cody kind of uncomfortable. And yes, Cody knows that Obi-Wan has made an art out of this ability he has to mould himself to best suit whoever he's interacting with, but Cody knows him well enough now to understand there's no way it was a skill developed by choice. Cody wonders sometimes what made Obi-Wan realize that his armour could be weaponized.

*

"Six," Skywalker repeats for probably the tenth time since they've all sat down at their table. "No one needs to hear six speeches, especially not before dinner."

"Think of it like a diplomatic mission, Master, "Ahsoka says, helpfully. The corners of Rex's lips twitch. Cody wonders exactly how many diplomatic missions Ahsoka's even been on, given the war.

"Six is really quite reasonable, unfortunately," Senator Bail Organa assures him. He's just sat down and still willing to engage Skywalker in his whining. They all know that the real reason he's upset as sitting on the complete opposite side of the room, engaged in a passionate debate with her table mates and not even within Skywalker's eye line, let alone close enough to communicate. Cody wonders if the seating arrangements were done deliberately and, if so, if the organizer realized the torture to which they have condemned everyone else at Skywalker's table.

Organa turns away from Skywalker when it becomes clear he's very determined to glare a whole through his plate.

"I admit I was surprised you weren't one of the speakers, Ben," he says. "How did you manage to slip out of that one?"

"None of us were asked," Obi-Wan says. "I suppose we can't be trusted without a pre-approved list of soundbites in front of us."

"Nah," Skywalker says. "It's only me they don't trust with a microphone." And then, glancing up with a little smirk, "They just know you'd conveniently disappear on important Jedi business just before you're supposed to give your speech."

"I'm certain I don't know what you could be implying, Anakin."

"""Honestly, if I were you I'd just put a tracker on him," Organa says, chuckling. If it weren't so undignified Cody's pretty sure Obi-Wan would elbow Organa in the ribs.

"We all know you couldn't put it on his robes," Anakin says, now openly grinning. "Not at the rate he loses them. I wonder if you could just hide it in the beard?"

"When we're talking about a Jedi you could just as easily put it in their lightsaber," Organa points out.

"Unfortunately," Obi-Wan says innocently, "some of us have tendencies to lose lightsabers."

Anakin and Ahsoka both look away in identical attempts to hide their embarrassment. Cody tries not to say anything for about half a second then gives up.

"In the middle of a battle tracking your lightsaber would be just as likely to find me as it would you, Sir."

Obi-Wan waves a hand dismissively. "But I always know where it is, intent creates a difference."

Rex and Organa chuckle, but Skywalker and Ahsoka are too busy pretending not to stare at Obi-Wan to join in.

"You could just inject it into him, Commander," Rex suggests.

"Like a pet," Ahsoka agrees. "If found please return to the 212'th."

Skywalker curls an arm around his stomach, the action mostly hidden by the tablecloth. Cody wonders if there's something wrong with the food. No one else looks unwell and Cody feels fine other than the head ache that really only goes away when he's dosed up on painkillers after an injury.

"Cody would never," Obi-Wan says, mock-indignant.

"Haha," says Cody, expressionless. Ahsoka chokes on her drink and spends the next thirty seconds trying to hide behind the decorative centrepiece while she gets her laughter under control.

"Will you at least tell me where it is?" Obi-Wan says, fondly exasperated.

"The speeches are starting," Skywalker says loudly.

"Oh good," Obi-Wan says dryly under his breath, but his face is serene when he turns toward the raised platform at the front of the hall where the Chancellor is taking his place.

*

Cody finds Rex and Ahsoka sitting on a bench in the antechamber outside of the hall. Ahsoka is still and quiet and probably meditating, if barely. Rex is hunched forward a bit, hands clasped together between his knees, jaw tense.

"What happened?" Cody asks, keeping his voice low.

"Nothing," says Rex.

"Politicians are assholes," Ahsoka says. "Master Obi-Wan is right."

"Politicians are people," Cody says reasonably. "There's always going to be a few you don't like."

"Little gods," Rex says. "You're spending way too much time with General Kenobi, vod."

"I'm just saying, the General can be a bit... harsh."

"No," Ahsoka says, finally opening her eyes. "Comparing clones to blaster power packs is "harsh". Luckily another senator was right there to point out that clones are just as human as anyone else, which makes them way better than all those kriffing aliens. How are these planets even allowed in the Republic if those are their views?"

Cody can not tell a Jedi that it isn't her place to question the people giving the orders, which is what he would have told any of his brothers if they'd asked the same thing, and also probably what most Jedi would tell Ahsoka if they were here. To challenge a bad call on the battle field is one thing-- the Jedi did *not* get appropriate tactical training, and it *shows*-- but to start questioning the whole fabric of their governing body is different. Dangerous.

Luckily, Skywalker comes out of the main doors at that moment, upper half twisted as he finishes a conversation with someone inside. He almost passes by the three of them, but stops at the far end of the bench and turns around.

"Snips? You ok?"

"I'm fine, Master," Ahsoka says, and it's an obvious enough lie that even Skywalker notices.

"The Commander has some questions for you about eligibility for Republic membership," Cody says, ignoring Rex and Ahsoka's matching glares.

A vein in Skywalker's forehead twitches. "That sounds... educational."

"Sir," Cody inclines his head and definitely does not run away.

Inside everything is too loud and too bright, but nobody pays him any attention so he can make his way back to the table and nurse his increasing head ache in relative piece.

Organa and Amidala are already there, passing a datapad back and forth between them. They've also managed to procure an entire bottle of some sort of florescently blue liqueur.

"Commander Cody!" Amidala says, as soon as he's close enough. Neither of the senators look drunk, which, given the half-empty state of the bottle is both impressive and alarming.

"Hello, Senator," Cody clasps his hands behind his back.

"I wanted to say," she continues, "If you see Master Kenobi before I do, please pass on my compliments. I had no idea he was so well-versed in socioeconomic's."

Cody's head throbs. Organa looks like he's having the time of his life.

"He was making a very compelling case for anarchocommunism when I left," Amidala says.

"...Oh," says Cody, because he's not even surprised, really. "To the most conservative senators he could find, I assume?"

"I'm reasonably certain there was a prince," Organa says. "A few high-paid government bureaucrats."

Amidala's innocent poker face has held up well until Organa mentioned the prince, but at that point she starts laughing silently into her glass. For a few seconds Cody seriously considers just sitting down and looking pathetic enough to be offered some of the liqueur. Obi-Wan survived the first 35 years of his life just fine without Cody to drag him out of ridiculous situations. Well. For given definitions of fine that include accidentally using the Dark Side to avenge his dead Master, being at least 20 pounds underweight, more stims than Cody wants to think about, Anakin Skywalker, regular bouts of being passively suicidal, actually accepting an appointment to the Jedi Council, and a three foot high tower constructed from boxes of tea of which he is legitimately proud.

Cody goes to find him.

*

For all that Obi-Wan may despise politicians the fact remains that he is very good at talking to them. Which is, probably, the only thing that saves the Jedi/clone delegation from coming off entirely unfit for high society. Ahsoka and Skywalker perform courtesy and dignity like grudging children trained to play at charming for a group of adults, and however stiff and awkwardly uncomfortable Rex looks Cody is certain that he himself is ten times worse.

Late in the evening, when Cody has started breathing through his head ache like he would a battlefield injury, a pair of men in stiff suits ask Cody flat out how long it will be until the patent on his genome expires and how many NDAs they'd have to sign in the meantime to get a look. About two minutes after that, a Kel Dor woman cheerfully informs Anakin that her daughter used to love watching him on the illegal podracing circuit on the lower levels of Coruscant. Obi-Wan leaves, and comes back with two glasses of Corellian brandy, one of which he hands to Rex.

"Uh," says Rex. "The Commander and I agreed it wouldn't be appropriate to drink tonight, Sir."

"Oh no," Obi-Wan says immediately. "How terribly rude of me. I suppose I'd best take it off your hands."

"That was the least subtle thing I've seen all night," Cody says, flatly. He makes sure to glance toward Skywalker just so Obi-Wan understands exactly how low that bar is.

"When is it not horribly rude to leave?" Ahsoka asks under her breath.

"We're almost there," Obi-Wan says. He's probably got it timed down to the minute. There's probably a chart.

"I'm stuck here until Senator Amidala decides to leave," Anakin says.

Obi-Wan's eyebrows shoot upwards. "Anakin, are you sure that's wise?"

Skywalker's chin tips up. "Am I not allowed to have friends now, Master?"

Obi-Wan opens his mouth, then clearly thinks better of it for once. It is one of the great joys in Cody's life, not having a stake in Skywalker's personal life, closely followed by the fact that Skywalker has yet to realize that there are rather a lot of circumstances in which Cody technically outranks him.

The silence that follows Skywalker's question is one of the more uncomfortable of Cody's life. Skywalker isn't usually so brazen about his ...whatever with Amidala, and Obi-Wan isn't usually so careless with the implication of his awareness. Obi-Wan is also, now that he looks closely, swaying just a little bit on his feet. Stims wearing off, and Cody can't remember seeing him gone long enough to have slept after they'd gotten back to the ship from their latest mission. So that's at least 45 hours.

He'd at least let one of the medics fix up the blaster burn on his leg, which had had the secondary bonus of allowing Cody to escape before someone tried to tell him he had a concussion again. Things Cody does not have time for: self-sacrificing Jedi generals and tiny brain injuries (yes, Kix, he's fucking aware they're technically brain injuries, he paid attention during that rant the first three times). Cody may have, at one point, had to check his rosters to make sure Kix hadn't been transferred to the 212th and he just hadn't noticed, but apparently he's just dedicated enough that it feels like he's always there.

"I need to get some air," Skywalker says, finally. Ahsoka looks ready to follow him and Rex looks ready to follow her, but Obi-Wan puts a hand on her shoulder. "Let him be, Padawan," he says. "He needs a moment to release his emotions."

When Obi-Wan had first mentioned the concept of releasing one's emotions to the Force Cody had thought it sounded perfect, and had considered asking him to teach a non-Force-dependant technique to the men. But it hadn't taken him long to realize that releasing emotions looked an awful lot like ignoring them and bottling them up and-- well. Cody's seen brothers who repressed things like that and it's never good. As annoying and kind of awkward as it can be, he's really very glad that Skywalker gets emotional now and then; the thought of all that building up inside of him for years is frankly horrifying. Cody likes the galaxy in one piece, thank you.

*

"Did you notice," Obi-Wan says as they're walking through the Senate district towards the Temple, "that the Chancellor was preparing to come speak with us, had in fact started walking over, right up until Anakin left?"

"I suppose," says Cody, who had noticed but not thought anything of it. "I assumed he got distracted."

"Hmm," Obi-Wan says, and then nothing else. Cody is, unfortunately, used to this. He could press, knows the sorts of questions that will get Obi-Wan to outline his thought process, but that would also involve caring about the subject matter enough to try.

Rex and Ahsoka had shared an air taxi back to the Temple and the on-planet barracks available for clones, but Cody is glad Obi-Wan had asked if he'd like to walk. The air is as close as you can get to fresh on Coruscant, and the ornamental greenery along some of the paths seems to soften the clatter of footsteps and hum of traffic. Cody is comfortable in any environment and would never admit a preference, but the sterile ships and industrial crush of humanity that is Coruscant makes him miss Kaminan oceans. It has been actual months since he's experienced rain and it's surprising just how much he's aware of the lack.

"Would you mind if I came with you to the barracks?" Obi-Wan asks suddenly. "That is, if you weren't intending to return to the Negotiator tonight."

"I wasn't," Cody lies. "Of course you can come, General, though I can't imagine why you'd want to."

Obi-Wan is silent for a few blocks, then says, speaking quickly, "I suspect it would be inadvisable if I were to be alone with access to alcohol tonight. And your left pupil is slightly larger than the right and you look like you're about to be sick, and I'd rather not find you unconscious tomorrow morning."

"I don't have a concussion," Cody says, a little irritably.

"Of course not," Obi-Wan says, and Cody bristles because that's the same pasifying tone he regularly uses on Obi-Wan.

"If you come back with me I expect you to actually sleep," Cody says, his annoyance and the pain behind his eyes making him snappish. "Stims just to attend a Senate event, Obi-Wan?"

"In all fairness, it was a Senate event specifically dedicated to us."

"I'm sure someone else could have taken your place."

"And completely failed to make any use of the opportunity, no doubt," Obi-Wan retorts. "We both know I wasn't just making small talk."

Cody shrugs. Obi-Wan is right, as inconvenient as it is.

They make the rest of the walk in silence. Cody finds an unoccupied officers' bunk and almost collapses in relief when he sees it comes with a tiny private fresher. He leaves Obi-Wan unlacing his boots and goes to stick his head under the cold tap for a few minutes and let his body decide if it really does need to vomit.

Cody takes the time while Obi-Wan is in the fresher to skim the work still waiting for him on his datapad. He signs off a couple requisitions, one transfer request, and is in the midst of finishing up his AAR from the last mission when Obi-Wan squishes himself into the tiny bed beside him, smelling like generic toothpaste and soap. Cody absently makes room, lifting his arm long enough for Obi-Wan to tuck himself against his side and trying to type one-handed while he gets comfortable.

They don't often share sleeping space, but Obi-Wan is more like Cody and his brothers than Jedi stereotypes would lead you to believe. He sleeps better when he's physically close to other people, likes the reassurance of being protected and protector against anything that might try to attack them while vulnerable. On missions and on the ship he always sleeps alone, knows that no matter what he says most of the troops wouldn't be comfortable with their General joining a pile of brothers after a bad mission. The higher Cody's come up the chain of command the more and more he can appreciate this, and he often finds it just as easy to curl up with Obi-Wan as with his brothers.

"Does the Inquiry have any more inquiries?" Obi-Wan asks. They've both made the same joke at least six times each since the latest senatorial investigation into one of their missions. cody still laughs.

"Why even ask? I think I can answer most of them, might have to talk to the initial strike team again, and there's one you'll need to give your justification for."

"Forward it to me? I've got at least a hundred messages just in the past few hours."

Cody frowns. "You said you were going to sleep."

"You've been awake just as long as I have."

"That's not true," Cody says. It is definitely true.

Obi-Wan flops back, using Cody's arm as a pillow. "Go to sleep, Cody."

"You're not going to wake me up in three hours, are you?"

"I did listen to Kix's rant."

Cody grins. "Just checking."

Cody shuts down his datapad because Obi-Wan keeps frowning up at him and not at all because the harder he tries to focus on the words in front of him the more they swim out of focus. As soon as Cody slides down in the bed Obi-Wan curls up against him, one leg thrown over his and hands tucked up between their chests. He must be exhausted enough that it's manifesting in physical discomfort for him to be seeking contact so openly.

Cody closes his eyes and, matching his breathing to Obi-Wan's, he lets himself fall asleep.


End file.
